Placing aside for a moment Obasanjo’s colossal failure in setting Nigeria on the right trajectory at the commencement of the fourth republic, his pronouncement (Frost Over the World interview, below) that the Niger Delta unrest is a criminal issue rather than a political one is not only immensely offensive, it betrays the fact that the man just does not have a grasp of the situation.
How can a man who has been president on two occasions, two decades apart, not fully understand the underlying political issues that are the root causes of the current instability in the Niger Delta? How could he ever so carelessly transpose the criminality of a handful of opportunistic kidnappings and bunkering onto an entirely legitimate political agitation?
Perhaps if he had directed more of the revenues from oil to the development of the areas from whence those revenues derived, while he was President and Federal Minister of Petroleum, the Niger Delta unrest might have dissipated by now!
Impressive woman, Mrs. Ibru—though I wish she came across more as a private business leader than a defensive-evasive politician. Impressive nonetheless.
My college-level exposure to political science taught me about the political spectrum in terms of a continuum that ranges from left to right.
Effectively, one’s position on social and economic issues were constrained into this left-right continuum, such that if one favored a highly-controlled economy one was on the extreme left, and if one supported a highly unregulated economy, one was on the extreme right. Similarly, on the social dimension, if one was collectivist, one was to the left and if one tended towards individualism, one mapped to the right.
Jimmy Wales (founder of Wikipedia) discussed his views on the future of the free content movement, at a Wikimania conference in Frankfurt. He details 10 important things he feels will be free (in the “free content” sense) by the next decade.
In summary: Howard Dean, who had been a leading contender for the Democratic Presidential nomination for the 2004 elections, came 3rd in the Iowa caucus, and subsequently addressed an Iowa crowd of supporters. The rest, as they say, is history. Howard Dean’s candidacy went down the drain following his excited scream (”… then we’re going to Washington, D.C., to take back the White House, Yeah!!!“ … ), and the media’s subsequent obsession with, and inane unending micro-analysis of, the “scream” that was said to be “un-presidential.” By some account, the clip was shown an estimated 633 times in the four days following the incident!
1. Power and Energy
2. Food Security and Agriculture
3. Wealth Creation and Employment
4. Mass Transportation
5. Land Reform
6. Security
7. Qualitative and Functional Education
Don’t read too much into this election. It is a clear cut. There is no historical guidance either because no Black person has ever come this close. While there are all kinds of sentiments about OBAMA, Americans are not ‘dummies’ when they want something different. While it is not OVER until the fat lady sings, it looks very good for the Brother. Thus far, he is having a great campaign, and is a cut above the ordinary. His center stage makes all the difference.
In the so called God’s own country, politicians use words such as ‘FIGHT’ for this or that, to indicate their sense of commitment. Why FIGHT? It is shameful that an election that should denote the highest level of civility is subject to all kinds of innuendoes, falsehood, misrepresentation and machinations were what goes on in America to happen elsewhere, they will be labeled barbaric. But in our own very America, grown folks lie, use imprudent means and tactics, in the name of wanting to serve and to win at all cost.
